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Wednesday, December 7, 2016

IWSG: Whew!

Time for a huge sigh of relief: I survived the insanity of NaNo! Time for a sigh of another sort: I'm not done with the book, and I had to take several days off from writing as soon as the month ended, to attend a conference. Now that's done and I'm digging out from under the home chores I neglected. Renewed respect for those who have full-time jobs and families and still manage to write even 100 words a day. You rock.

As for how NaNo went: I hit and passed the 50K mark (ended the month at 52,196), and have at least a partial image in my mind of how the rest of the book goes. I'm still hopeful that I can keep up the pace and finish before Xmas. Of course, I'm also at that point in the book where I am suffering serious doubts about what I'm doing and if I've really muffed it this time. It always seems to hit me about this point in a book (somewhere around 2/3). Last year, I made it to about 7/8, and then, lost and confused, let it slip away from me. That's not happening this time (and last year's book is next up, for a fresh take with me ready to do the work it needs to get finished).

Now on to this month's IWSG question of the month, which is a good one. As in, one I haven't really given any thought, even though when I see it it's obvious I *should* be thinking about it!

DECEMBER'S QUESTION: In terms of your writing career, where do you see yourself five years from now, and what’s your plan to get there?

I suppose if pushed, I'd just say that I expect to be doing about what I am now: writing books and publishing them at whatever pace I manage. But that's not exactly a career plan. It's probably realistic enough: it means just continuing to do what I'm doing, which is taking myself as a writer about 75% seriously. That might be okay. But a part of me would like to finally start taking the risks I need to step it up a notch: writing and submitting short stories, maybe even shopping Gorg around to the publishers instead of doing it myself. So for a happy vision of five years from now, I see myself with a bunch of refereed publishing credits under my belt.

(Note: I also see myself spending a lot of time traveling, and the two may not be 100% compatible. So what I may need to do to get to that point is to learn to both write AND edit in less optimal conditions. We'll see.)

Okay, your turn. What's your plan? Or if you don't want to go there, how did your NaNo go?

10 comments:

I'm not giving up on managing to do both. My eldest son writes when we backpack. He can fill a steno pad on a 7-day trip. Of course, he's not doing the cooking--but I can't say it uses a lot of time. I'm just lazy--I read all afternoon while he is writing.

I think that's up to us (holding a January NaNo). Any month can be NaNo, and in fact I'm coming more and more to like that approach to creating a rough rough draft when needed. I've been lucky enough three times now to be in a position to do that during the official month, and get a little energy from the hype.

Congrats on the new book! That's great! I've been trying to respect my own personal writing pace as well, and not compare myself to other writers. It's definitely difficult at times, so I appreciate your goal. :-) Good luck!

In one of Madeleine L'Engle's books the main character quotes, apparently from at least 3 different people, the line "Comparisons are odious." It's not a bad thing to remember. The only thing we should be comparing ourselves to is ourselves. Are we doing the best we can, and pushing ourselves a bit? Then we are good, even if we can't rival J.K. Rowling or Ivan Doig.